Thanks. I thought I remembered same diameter, which is why I threw in the parenthetical, but I guess I could have been clearer.
Still, seeing the renders again is cool.
But it'd still be tricky to have a magazine designed for the (looks to be roughly) 30% longer Viper be able to cram in additional Mk31s. The handling equipement would have to be able to squeeze the missiles closer and have the saved space add up to at least one additional missile length (and have 1 extra 'row' of handling equipment to handle the additional 'row' of shorter missiles. Not impossible, but I'm guessing more complexity than likely got built into the Kanatas. I've no doubt you can load an Katana up with a pure Mk31 loadout. I'd just be shocked if you got could fit much, if any, extra CMs by doing so. (Save you money though as long as you're sure you won't need to engage anything but missiles)
Weird Harold wrote:wastedfly wrote:Stating Vipers are fire and forget is akin to finally admitting water is wet. CM's are fire and forget outside of very basic positional data broadcast required.
Vipers' FAF capability is touted in textev as a major breakthrough. CMs on the other hand are limited by the number of links available to control them. If CMs were truly FAF they wouldn't need control links or updates from the launching ship.
For what little it's worth Vipers fire and forget capabilities were mentioned specifically in reference to engaging other LACs. Those are quite different targets than MDMs.
On the one hand they've got better stealth; missile wedges are anything but subtle.
On the other hand LACs usually much lower closing velocity; so you launch from closer in, and they always have
way lower acceleration, so they can produce a vastly smaller change in their current vector in the 75 seconds or so a Viper takes to reach them; less room to search if your lock goes fuzzy.
lyonheart wrote:Hi Jonathan_S,
The SD class PDLC's have more emitters than any other, for anti missile duties more than anti LAC; you may be confusing the Roland's 10 broadside lasers primary targets.
Given the velocity of the Mk-31/Viper, 53% more than the average missile, plus the Katana's stealth that reduces the enemies effective range so it has to come close means the Katana is indeed quite the LAC killer, yet we have no textev the differences between the Viper and Mk-31 require magazine differences.
L
I know that on an SD they do, but I had an (apparently erroneous) memory that the Katana's clusters were SD power (laser emitter diameter), but with fewer emitters clustered than an SD would.
For example (if I'm deciphering the model number correctly) the old Peep Duquesne-class SD used PDLCs that were a cluster of eight 16cm lasers. I was (again apparently erroniously) thinking the Katanas had a trio of clusters each with, say,
four 16cm lasers. SD power, but not SD cyclic rate (due to reduced number of emitters per cluster)
But now I'm not sure how/where I got that impression because I've gone back and failed to find supporting text-ev.
At All Costs simply says "equipped with what were for all intents and purposes a trio of superdreadnought point defense laser clusters"
(But that's where I was coming from. oops)